Absolutio
by Cassie Jamie
Summary: You looked so far away. [Slash, angst]


Disclaimer: Not mine.

Pairing: Danny/Martin

Rating: G

Summary: "You looked so far away."

Notes: This one I started a long time ago, and was originally Jack/Danny.  I changed it one day and if it seems rushed, it's because I couldn't keep writing this and I REALLY needed it off my harddrive.  I thought I could deal with the topic itself, but some things have happened in my life recently…I just can't continue this the way I would like.

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Absolutio

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            I learned early in life that I would have to deal with everything that got thrown my way.  Each thing on my own shoulders, carried and broken.

            Then Danny worked his way into the fabric of my life, refusing to leave.  He taught me to lean on him – against the bellows of my heart.  I became accustomed to waking up during night with his body molded around me, his head tucked so his eyes were stationed at the crease of neck and torso and my chin rested on my scalp.  Got used to him cooking for me and showering with me.

            And just as I ended the argument in my mind, giving in to that side that remembered what it was to have someone take care of me…

            He came home with a look on his face I'd never seen before.  His eyes were red; he would only stare at the floor.

            _"What's the matter?" I ask, watching him as he settles onto the couch with head in his hands._

            _He doesn't answer._

            _"Danny?"_

            _"It's not the flu…" He starts, "I have to go down to the hospital tomorrow."_

            _"Okay, now you're scaring me."_

            _As I sit down beside him, he finally looks to me, tears slipping down his face.  This is not like him; something is definitely wrong here.  "The doctor…He…Martin, he thinks I've got cancer."_

            He slumbers beside me, crying out every time his head hits the mattress instead of the pillow.

            I tug him closer to me.  Lying on my back, he curls to me and rests his cheek on my chest.  Stroke his hair, I know he's exhausted and wants this nightmare to end.

            An eye cracks open, "I'm not asleep."

            "Apparently."

            "You should go to work." He tells me, customary by now but lackluster in desire.  He knows I don't actually work anymore; Jack hands out the assignments as usual, but Vivian and Sam go off while I sit at the desk and get information for them – I fumbled one case and I won't tell him that I was suspended for a few days because I couldn't keep my mind on my job.

            "Jack kicked me out this morning."

            The antiseptic scent of the room wafts to me as it always does when Marilyn opens the door, carrying in the normal afternoon treatment of chemotherapy.  She smiles as she goes about hooking it up to the catheter in my angel's chest, soothing the aching flesh with a gentle touch of fingers that he won't let me give him because he thinks its ugly.

            He wonders often these days why I'm still here with him, as though he were unworthy of being loved when he's so sick.

            I managed yesterday to weasel from him that no one would care for him when he was ill since they were so fearful of catching his illnesses.  He laughed when he told me that, almost as if the foster service had let him down was merely a speck on his radar.

            "Martin?"

            I pull myself back to the present, "What, love?"

            He shrugs lightly, one hand gripping mine like he does at the times that he really thinks I'm going to walk away and never come back, "You looked so far away."

            "Thinking of how messy the apartment is.  You're going to have a grand old time making me clean it when you come home."

            His eyes sparkle at the mere mention that he'll even get home and that's the moment I realize that his foster mother has been calling again.  The bitch who thinks it's her job to ruin his adoptive son's hope; that she has to tell the bitter facts that Danny might not ever see our place again if this round of chemo doesn't help.

            Eventually he manages to roll into slumber, and it makes me happy as a few minutes here and there are all he can get between the treatments and the vomiting.  Food is a bone of contention, but he eats if I plead and I think Marilyn's conversed with him over the topic.

            I know he'll be out long enough for me to make a run to the rest room and to grab some coffee, so I kiss his forehead then slip into the hallway, turning off the light as I go.

            "Hey, Martin." The nurses all smile when I walk past the station.

            I chant back a hello; they know I'm taken and thus their smiles are genuine.  (Unlike the woman I yelled at during interrogation.)  They return to their duties while I make for the door, grabbing at my belt buckle in an effort to make my time pass more efficiently.

            A hand on my arm though, "Mr. Fitzgerald."

            Ah, that would be his nurse…  Absolutely refuses to call me by my first name, yet she teases Danny relentlessly by calling him Daniel, "Mari.  What's up?"

            "Mr. Taylor's bloodwork."

            The smile slips from my face and I'm sure I'm no longer any color except white, "The chemo was helping?"

            "Last round was delayed and the therapy loses its effectiveness when it is, so it's no longer fighting what it's supposed to.  The radiation didn't do too much good either." Her face belays her emotions and it's right there that it hits me.

            He's already a marked man.

            "Martin?" She asked, "Dr. Carlton is going to come down later and talk about other options."

            "Oh…oh-kay.  I need to…go call someone." I stammer out, my heart thudding under my skin as she walks away and I try to figure out if I should call Jack first or Daniella.

            It doesn't matter though.

            Doesn't matter anymore because I'm numb and tired and I need to sit down before I fall down.  But it's too late because I must have already since now the woman's coming back with two doctors.

            The floor is cooling my forehead.

            My body feels like its overheating and my heart beats faster.  Thuds against my ribs when someone touches my arm to garner my attention, "Martin."

            "I'm alright."

            Someone else answers, "No, you're not."

            And for once, I can't defend myself against their correct assumption because I'm not alright and I doubt I will be.


End file.
